The communications industry continues to rely upon advances in technology to realize higher-functioning systems at cost-effective prices. Telephony signals can now be transmitted by methods and systems including traditional publicly-switched telephone networks (PSTN), Internet telephony service providers (ITSP), packet-based systems, digital wireless systems, analog wireless systems, private branch exchanges (PBX), cable systems, T1 systems, integrated service digital networks (ISDN), and digital subscriber line (DSL) systems, to name a few. Widespread acceptance and usage of communication systems and services are largely a function of cost and user convenience.
One of the current issues delaying the widespread adoption of Voice-over-Internet protocol (VoIP) technologies in the telephony space is that there is not currently a critical mass of end-users of the technology. Communication is a two-way process and therefore instituting a new communication network is a circular problem. A principle motivation for a user's interest in a particular communication network is the knowledge that a sufficient quantity of other users may be contacted through the communication network. Each new user utilizing a communication network also increases the utility of the communication network since the devices used to initiate communications also typically serves as an outlet to receive communication from other users.
There are very few companies who are deploying VoIP technologies for their private branch exchange (PBX) and communications needs. Thus, in attempting to increase the demand for VoIP technologies, end-users have no easy access to equipment implementing the technology. Individual consumers cannot purchase IP phones in the retail channel and plug it into a home DSL or broadband connection. Another problem is that specialized forms of end-user VoIP technology require special equipment, detailed computer knowledge or, at a minimum, the use of cumbersome (e.g., calling-card) services in order to access a VoIP network to gain access to low-cost toll bypass long distance services. Consequently, with too few users directly accessible through a VoIP network and non-users inaccessible, a VoIP-based telephony system has not yet attained widespread acceptance.
Conventional ITSP “hop-off” gateway services operate by placing a finite number of service provider-owned gateways (to the VoIP network) at various discrete geographic locations around the world. These gateways bridge a local PSTN and the Internet. Users must specifically access one of these gateways in order to jump from one side of the network to another. Typically centralized VoIP services are “invisible” to users, operating as any conventional long-distance carrier with users provided a system access telephone number and phone cards for metering system usage. This type of gateway service is expensive to operate because dedicated local multi-user network gateways providing termination services for a plurality of users are required. Owners of this dedicated equipment are only willing to exchange network termination service using their equipment for a fee, thus reducing cost savings to the consumer. Additionally, infrastructure costs of these termination centers cause VoIP deployment to be expensive, and therefore slow.
Accordingly, there is a need for a cost-effective approach for VoIP telephony services in order to gain widespread acceptance. Such an approach should take into consideration end-users' expectations of accessing any other telephone in the world using existing telephone equipment, user interfaces and user calling paradigms, while not requiring the deployment and services of dedicated centralized network infrastructure to bridge the IP and PSTN networks. A broadband telephony system and method that address the aforementioned problems, as well as other related problems, are therefore desirable.